Is the Demise of Second Life Nearing?

We got thrown by The Peanut Vendor. It looked like it was his job until he bungled it.

We arrived 1/20/2009.

YOu know- you say that as if it's a bad thing! You really should drop by sometime

*basks*

I thought she had a rock or something there?

Not necessarily.

The problem with openspace wasn't just one isolated incident that caused mere emotional trauma for those who lost time and money in it. It is one in a series of acts and omissions that tend to show that one can't trust their money with Linden Lab.

No sane person would spend any substantial amount of money based upon the lopsided Terms of Services Linden Labs provides. You give us your money, we guarantee nothing, you're not allowed to sue us if we screw you, but we can do whatever we want to you, and by the way we'll change the agreement at whim.

The only reason one might consider dealing with Linden Lab under such draconian terms is if they trusted Linden Lab not to screw them. Linden Lab continuously proves it cannot be trusted.

Sure, other people will fill into the market after others drop out- after all, there's a sucker born every minute. But one cannot develop a reputation and brand name of someone like Sarah Nerd, for example, overnight.

Yes, indeed. The pieces on SL this blogger has written are filled with ridiculous assertions and questionable logic.

(Take, for example, this gem from the most recent piece: "The [SL] world shambles on, thanks to a devoted cadre of users." Well, yes. As do the NFL, Facebook, McDonalds, Google.....each has a devoted cadre of users. Er.....isn't that true of every successful business enterprise?)







This seems so obvious. And yet I bet the point you make here hasn't occurred to one corporate SL user in 50.

I'm saving it for retirement.

Contrary to what is sometimes posted in these forums, SL is just another online business.

It isn't the holy grail, or the future of civilisation. All that happened is some reasonably clever folk got together and came up with something new(ish). As soon as something new(er) and better comes along we'll all jump ship to that.

It is what it is.

Enjoy it as a diversion, a hobby, an environment to play at entrepreneurship.

Just understand that it's as ephemeral as the average SL love affair and leave it at that.

Just to set the record absolutely straight. As of about 5pm EST today, both the Reuters and CNN sims were there and in good repair. Neither were for sale nor were they abandoned. The staff may not be hanging out there, but Second Life still gets the monthly tier. Sometimes it pays to check one's facts. The blogger at Forbes didn't.

...Makes you wonder why they give him space on their site...certainly his presence does NOT enhance their reputation.

I definitely don't see it as the Holy Grail, or as any other variety of mystical entity.

But I don't see how "online business" is reasonably equated with "ephemeral".

For all you know, this particular business will thrive for many decades.

I guess it's all relative Ponsonby.. the average person's life span could be seen as ephemeral compared to say , that of a really,really, really old galapogas tortoise...

Will SL's lifespan be similarly curtailed in comparison to Woolworths.. which my Gran admittedly did believe of as the Holy Grail? I'd definitely take a punt and say Yes.. but you never know.

From a business perspective and bringing in a bit of that old man Porter to help, you'd have to say barriers to entry are low, Customer loyalty and switching costs are low.. so it's a pretty dynamic and competitive market.. which doesn't often help middle size businesses like SL, who are at best in the doldrums even now.

If nothing else, I'd suggest they aren't thriving now, so they most likely won't be in 10 years time.

My question still stands though.. who really and truly gives a toss..?

I've got more than 300 avatars in SL that won't carry over to another virtual world. The content in SL creates a massive barrier to entry for competing virtual worlds.

Quoted for truth!

Oh dear..

I admit that a minority have invested so much in SL that it would be difficult to leave. When I talk about switching costs though I'm talking about the "average" user.. the big bit of the bell curve so to speak.

There is no massive barrier, the only thing that keeps other entrants out of the "market" at the moment is that there isn't a proven market yet.

I'm not a luddite, I'm actually the reverse. Even reasonable forecasts see exponential growth in computing capacity and available bandwidth over the next 2 decades so yes some sort of immersive 3d web will evolve. The question is will it look like SL and if not do LL have the resource or the foresight to keep up.

I'm guessing no to all of those questions and if the majority which isn't embedded up to the hilt in SL leaves, you'll have a lot of low lag space to move your 300+ avatars around in.

Anyway.. I have to apologise. I'm the least qualified person in the world to give a Business 101 lecture.

SL may or may not fall by the wayside, but it's a business not a real world and hence is subject to all the vagaries this topsy turvey world presents to business of any sort.

My view is simply don't bet the farm on it being around in 5 years, but enjoy it for what it is now.

By the way.. 300+ avatars? You really have to hope that you're part of a minute minority or SL's published user figures are even worse than we thought!!

Hell just isn't the same with out her... and since only the good die young..

I suppose. But when the Miraculous Platform Of The Future comes along, if everybody just enjoys it for what it is then--if nobody is willing to invest any time, money, or affect in its success--it will be a short-lived miracle.

Maybe SL or 3D web technologies in general are just a flash in the pan, but smart people said that about the Web, the Internet, personal computers, TV, radio... possibly Gutenburg's printing press, for all I know.

Luckily there are always the OCD-afflicted who ignore all the best business sense.

The users that count... the ones spending money in SL and bringing money into the SL economy one way or another... are spending, well, let's see... 70-80 MILLION lindens a day bought through Lindex, or about US$300k per day. I suspect that most of the paying customers have hundreds of dollars worth of content by now.
One account, 300+ separate avatars, of so many different species I have to organize them taxoomically down to the suborder and genus to keep track of them.

Quoted for truth!



It doesn't have to be avatars. For us more human types, hair, clothes, shoes, boots, AO, tails, horns... It adds up. Plus builds! Houses, castles, towers, mansions, trees, plants, ground, water,... list goes on.


Really, if you've spent any amount of money at all in SL (not to mention putting it all together in a way that appeals), throwing it all out and starting over is a daunting prospect.

Minority indeed.

Hey!, I died young...it's just that death is not the barrier it used to be

I heard they were going to do another one, but got hung up on the graphics.

Amen sister. That' part of the reason I am not interested in any of those other places. I am not about to start all over again, besides the fact that some of them seem to need a bit of work to get them running besides just downlaoding the software, again more effort than I want to spend.

I am horrified over the stories of people losing entire inventories to the Server Goblins. I can safeley say that would cause me to hang it up, I would not go through getting set all up again.